Letter to His Father

Letter to His Father is the name usually given to the letter Franz Kafka

Franz Kafka

Franz Kafka was a major fiction writer of the 20th century. He was born to a middle-class German-speaking Jewish family in Prague, Bohemia , Austria–Hungary...

 wrote his father Hermann in November 1919, indicting him for his emotionally abusive and hypocritical behavior towards him.

Kafka hoped the letter would bridge the growing gap between him and his father, though in the letter he provides a sharp criticism of both:

"Dearest Father,

You asked me recently why I maintain that I am afraid of you.

Letter to His Father is the name usually given to the letter Franz Kafka

Franz Kafka

Franz Kafka was a major fiction writer of the 20th century. He was born to a middle-class German-speaking Jewish family in Prague, Bohemia , Austria–Hungary...

 wrote his father Hermann in November 1919, indicting him for his emotionally abusive and hypocritical behavior towards him.

Kafka hoped the letter would bridge the growing gap between him and his father, though in the letter he provides a sharp criticism of both:

"Dearest Father,

You asked me recently why I maintain that I am afraid of you. As usual, I was unable to think of any answer to your question, partly for the very reason that I am afraid of you, and partly because an explanation of the grounds for this fear would mean going into far more details than I could even approximately keep in mind while talking. And if I now try to give you an answer in writing, it will still be very incomplete..."

According to Max Brod

Max Brod

Max Brod was an Czech-Jewish author, composer, and journalist, known for his close friendship with Franz Kafka.- Biography :...

, Kafka actually gave the letter to his mother to hand on to his father. His mother never delivered the letter but returned it to her son. The original letter, 45 pages long, was typewritten by Kafka and corrected by hand. Two and a half additional pages were written by hand.

The letter, translated into English by Ernst Kaiser and Eithne Wilkins, was published in a bilingual edition by Schocken Books

Schocken Books

Schocken Books is a publishing company that was established in Berlin with a publishing office in Prague in 1931 by the Schocken Department Store owner Salman Schocken. It published the writings of Martin Buber, Franz Rosenzweig, Franz Kafka and S. Y...

 in 1966, and included in several Schocken collections of Kafka's works. A new translation by Hannah and Richard Stokes was published by Oneworld Classics in 2008 under the title Dearest Father.

Editions

• Letter to His Father. Bilingual edition. New York
  New York
  New York is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Northeastern regions of the United States and is the nation's third most populous. The state is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...
  
  : Schocken Books, 1966.
• Dearest Father. (Oneworld Classics, 2008) ISBN 978-1-84749-025-4

The following collections include Kafka's Letter to His Father (Kaiser and Wilkins translation):

• Dearest Father. Stories and Other Writings
  Dearest Father. Stories and Other Writings
  Dearest Father. Stories and Other Writings is a collection of writings by Franz Kafka translated by Ernst Kaiser and Eithne Wilkins with notes by Max Brod...
  
  . New York: Schocken Books, 1954.
• The Sons
  The Sons
  The Sons is a collection of stories by Franz Kafka.In 1913 Kafka wrote to his publisher Kurt Wolff requesting that three of his stories be placed in a single volume:...
  
  . New York: Schocken Books, 1989.